


One Long, Cold Winter

by Khaelis



Category: Call of Duty (Video Games), Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, Dark Doctor (Doctor Who), Episode AU: s03e08-09 Human Nature/Family of Blood, Eventual Romance, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fobwatched Doctor, Graphic Description, Graphic Description of Corpses, Gun Violence, Implied/Referenced Torture, Slow Burn, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-06-19 02:05:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15499905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khaelis/pseuds/Khaelis
Summary: November, 1940.Rose Tyler knew it wouldn't be easy to protect the Doctor from bloodthirsty aliens.She finds out it's not any easier to protect a daredevil professor on a quest for mythological artifacts in the middle of a world war.Especially when said professor becomes just as bloodthirsty as his enemies.[You don't need to play the game to read this!]





	1. November, 1940

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I've wanted to write that for quite some time, so here goes!  
> I've always liked the concept of the fobwatched Doctor, and I thought it would be nice to turn him into a zombie killer!
> 
> You don't need to have played the game to understand this - I mean, this is the Nazi Zombies mode we're talking about, so there's close to no background to the characters.  
> Of course, this is Doctor Who, so everything happening in this will be explained with "facts" (that is, there won't be any magic or supernatural stuff).
> 
> Anyway, here's the first chapter, a short prologue of some sorts, because I'm not sure lots of people will like the idea!
> 
> I hope you will, thanks for reading, and don't hesitate to let me know what you think! :)

* * *

 

 

It was dark. It smelled of burnt oil and old parchments, of gunpowder and blood. She would have liked to know it was a mere figment of her imagination, but the silver dagger covered in dried crimson lying next to its rusted companion were there to remind her it was all too real. A colt whose wooden grip had turned dirty, splintered, rotten. The hole of the cannon was black, a deep pit of death made irregular with the hundreds, thousands of bullets that had been shot. Even the warm light of the candle shedding its quiver of orange and yellow couldn’t make it prettier. It was a gun. He had fired that gun, so many times he had come home with a burnt mitten and a skin covered in furious blisters. 

 

She had made the mistake to let him go alone on what he called an adventure. He had insisted for days that he would never allow her to borrow his ride to that village near Naples. Just a quiet laugh and a shake of the head on the first occurrence, until he had threatened to lock her up in the basement with nothing to eat but the plagued rats, nothing to drink but the foul water of the pipework. She had never seen that look in his eyes before and, somehow, she had understood he had really meant it. So, she had let him go, after a promise he didn’t quite make that he would come back a week later, alive and well. 

 

But to know he had killed... A liquid, cold shiver rolled down her spine and she tightened her woolen shawl around her shoulders. She roughly pulled the drawer open and used a scotch-soaked rag to shove the cursed weapons inside. The glass hadn’t been picked up yet. That was one other thing she didn’t quite like about this man. His propensity to drink more than reason would advise - and his assertion that his brain worked better when fueled by alcohol didn’t make it much better. The first time he had been drunk had scared her, when he had thrown a temper, torn his work into tiny bits of paper and shucked them in the fireplace, smashed a chair against a wall and cursed at her with so much venom in his words she didn’t think she would ever heal from that poison. 

 

Rose didn’t like this man. She barely bore his presence whenever he fell into some kind of shallow sleep, whenever the weight of all that drinking was too much for his human body to stand. When he didn’t speak, when he didn’t look at her and didn’t touch her. It was only when she saw his face, untroubled by rage or frustration, that she remembered why she needed to stay. When she saw who he really was under that thick layer of turpitude and hatred. 

 

She picked up the glass and the bottle he used to fill it up, already empty after a couple of hours nursing it as he tried to figure out whatever a humanities professor was supposed to figure out - without much success, as proven by the small pile of cold ashes and the shards of glass from the broken lamp. She dropped the glass in the sink filled to the brim with undone dishes and the bottle in the bin that hadn’t been taken out for more than two weeks. She simply couldn’t find it in her to care about such trivial things when so much more was at stake. 

 

In the distance, a few miles to the east, an alarm blared. It had to be London, the nearest city that counted over a hundred people. She heard the heavy, loud, quick, constant noise,  _ tac tac tac tac _ , and she imagined the planes flying over the capital and the rain of bullets they cried all over those innocent people. She heard an explosion that must have been formidable - a bomb, several of them even. Hopefully, they had all missed their intended targets. Of all the centuries, millennia they could have chosen, all the countries and places they could have picked, it had to be the cold winter of 1940. She remembered enough from her lessons in school to know London wasn’t a good place to be at that time. The Blitz. The neverending air raids led by the German forces throughout Britain and all the graves they had left in their relentless wake. It was one of those nights. 

 

The small house, lost in a deep forest where no one would ever find them, shook on its foundations. She was used to it. The chandelier swung a little, the windows trembled, the plates clinked lightly on their cupboard. Not enough to draw him out of his slumber. She waited for the small-scale earthquake to die and the sirens to shut down before she made her way down the basement. There he was. That man, sprawled over his desk, the light snore and drool coming out of his mouth indicating he was either too tired or too inebriated to pay any attention to the war happening not so far away. 

 

She almost wanted to leave him in that awful position and let him suffer the consequences the morning later. But he was sleeping. And it wasn’t the man she didn’t like she was seeing. It was  _ him _ . It was her Doctor. 

 

Rose carefully picked his round glasses perched on the tip of his nose and folded them on the side. He snored just an octave deeper and squeezed his eyes tighter. She took off his tartan cap he kept screwed on the top of his head at all times, slid his pen out from between his fingers. Every page spread on the surface was a maze of scribbles and curses carved into the paper - obviously, isolation in a humid basement with no other light than a dying candle hadn’t done much good to his intelligence. She felt an ache in her heart. Her clever Doctor, brilliant Time Lord was reduced to less than a scoundrel, a failure of a professor that barely earned a living with illegal and dangerous missions that amounted to nothing. And a killer, the blisters on his hand and the dried blood under his fingernails reminded her. 

  
  


“Mister Hynd,” she whispered past the lump in her throat, giving his shoulder a gentle shove. “You should go to bed. Mister Hynd, wake up.”

  
  


Rose was only answered by a sudden, loud rattle on the door that stood in the dark on a wall opposite the desk. A door that was kept securely closed with a set of five locks and as many latches. A rattle, and an odd, raspy groan that twisted her stomach into knots and made her colder than she already was.

  
  


“Mister Hynd,” she insisted - she wanted to wake him up not to put him into bed, but to make sure she wouldn’t be alone if whatever was hidden behind that door decided to come out. “Come on, wake up for God’s sake.”

“What?” he drawled groggily, swatting his hand around as if she were an annoying fly he wanted to chase. “You can’t just lemme sleep, can you?”

“Not when your secret is trying to get free, no,” she said with a worried look towards the door. “What is it, Mister Hynd? Some kind of monster? An alien?”

  
  


He coughed out a laugh and pushed himself off the desk to lean into his chair. He stared at her with bloodshot eyes and a raised eyebrow, reached into his pocket to take out a rumpled box of cigarettes.

  
  


“When you can count up to five on your own fingers,” he started, bending towards the candle to light the tuft of tobacco hanging from the white paper, ”maybe I’ll tell you what it is, lass. Now get me a scotch, on the rocks.”

“As if we even have a freezer,” she snorted, still keeping an eye on the door that had went silent.

“It’s winter out there, woman, surely you’re not that dull,” he smirked as he groped his way througn another pocket to find his flask of amber liquor.

“I’m your assistant, not your maid of all work, Mister Hynd. You want ice, you go get it yourself. I’m done for today, I’m going to bed. Make sure to keep that thing locked up, yeah?”

“I don’t have suicidal tendencies,” he shrugged - and his smirk disappeared behind a cloud of smoke and a veil of disgust. “Not yet anyway. Thank you for your work today, Miss Tyler, I wouldn’t have gotten very far without your help. The weekly goods are delivered tomorrow morning, aren’t they? How about we share some tea and bread for breakfast?”

“Sure, if you’re not too hungover or, you know, too much of an arse,” she smiled a small smile - it was one of those rare occasions when he could be nice, even if it was always short-lived, and she felt like there was a bit of her Doctor bleeding through.

“ _ Arse _ is my middle name and  _ drunk bastard _ my last,” he said with playful poke on her hip, his lips stirred into a picture of familiarity. “If you only knew what I’ve seen, Miss Tyler. You’d enjoy your booze, too. Now go, you need your sleep. Use all the logs you need to keep yourself warm, we’ll get a whole truckload tomorrow. I want to take you on my next expedition, I’m going after an artifact the Luftwaffe wants and I might need you. Don’t get sick, lass, yeah?”

“You should really come up, too, you know,” she said, weaving her fingers through his despite her reluctance to touch such blood-stained hands. “I could set your bed by the fire, and…”

“Need to work, lass,” he interrupted through a sigh. “Need to find out the precise location of the artifact before we get on the road, and I won’t get anything figured out sleeping. Go on, maybe I’ll join you later, alright?”

“‘Kay,” she accepted, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. “Still want that scotch?”

“No, I want to keep a fresh head for tomorrow,” he winked before he leaned over his heavy tome covered in enigmatic drawings and complicated formulas. “‘Night, Miss Tyler. And  _ keep warm _ .”

  
  


The fire was crackling in the fireplace, its warmth and its light enveloping her body rolled into several layers of covers, still not enough to keep the cold away. The low sound of bombs and artillery had been replaced by the shrill sound of the blizzard lashing at the small house, making the windows and the door creak under its assault. Rose nestled her head deeper into her makeshift pillow, an old coat that had been abandoned in this shelter, a rough cotton that smelled of camphor and dust. She stared at the watch in the palm of her hand, brushed her thumb over the engraved circles and the weight of the chain burn her neck. Until she could open it, that would be her life.

 

One long, cold winter in the middle of a world war, somewhere she didn’t want to be, with someone she didn’t want to know. She closed her eyes over her tears and concealed the watch back under her jumper. It felt like the cold metal was thudding softly against her skin, a rhythmic double beat that echoed through her ribs and down to her heart.

  
  


“We’ll get through this, my Doctor,” she murmured into the hands she had brought to her mouth to keep the cold away. “We’ll make it. Just hold on in there. Just a few weeks, yeah? Just a few weeks…”

 

* * *

 


	2. Tipsy Yet?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> Thank you for the kudos and the comments already, I'm glad to know you're interested in this!  
> You might have noticed I've upped the rating and updated the tags for future chapters, just so you know what you're getting into!  
> I'm expecting each chapter to be 2500-3000 words, and I'm hoping to update this once a month (one chapter every week for each of my WIP, if I can manage to stick to that schedule!)
> 
> Anyway, here is another chapter I hope you'll enjoy!  
> Thanks for reading! :-)

* * *

 

 

“Bloody bastard!”

  
  


Rose woke up with a start and jerked into a sitting position at the sound of the shout that echoed from the basement. It was still dark outside, the blizzard was still raging around their small house, but the light and the warmth of the fire had dwindled down to a lukewarm orange glow. A quick look at the cuckoo clock hanging on the wall told her three hours had ticked away since she had left him to his work. She fumbled with her many layers of covers and plaids and hurried to her feet, just as a door was loudly slammed closed and locks clicked shut. She rushed down the cold steps of the stairs on her bare feet and found the basement barely lit enough to make out his figure swallowed in the dark. She took what little she could in. Another glass, another bottle that was missing half its contents already. So much for the clear head in the morning.

  
  


“Go back up, Miss Tyler,” he growled when he spotted her standing in the doorway, dragging his feet, step after step, to slouch in a difformed heap on his chair. “You’re supposed to be sleeping.”

“You’re supposed to be sober,” she pointed out as she made her way towards him.

“I’m perfectly sober. I had one drink is all. Now just go, lass, I need to be alone.”

  
  


The closer she got, careful to watch out for anything sign he might get physically violent, the better she saw the way he kept his long fingers clenched around his sleeve. She realized the red coating his fingers and soaking the wool of his worn jumper wasn’t just a product of the dying candlelight giving his skin an odd colour. He was bleeding. Profusely. While she didn’t care much about this man and his recklessness regarding whatever was hidden in that cellar, she also knew this was still the Doctor’s body. A human body that could die. She fiercely ignored the way her stomach heaved and grabbed him by an arm she rolled around her shoulders.

  
  


“What ‘re you doing, woman?” he seethed through his clenched teeth, heavy pearls of sweat rolling down his temples. “Lemme go, I need to stay ‘ere.”

“Shut up, Hynd,” she shot back as she nudged her shoulder under his armpit to relieve some of his weight - he was heavier than he looked, and his exhaustion and inebriation made it even worse. “You’re hurt, and I need to take care of it because you’re obviously unable to do it yourself. Fuck’s sake, you had to go around that thing in that state of yours, hadn’t you?”

“This is research, stupid girl, I won’t learn anythin’ if I don’t study it from up close!”

“Enough, Drostan!” she shouted, shoving him up the stairs when he wouldn’t follow her steps. “Get your arse in the couch and don’t move. You couldn’t even study your own toes right now!”

“Oh, I can already tell you, I’ve got eight of ‘em,” he slurred with a drunken grin.

  
  


As if to prove his point, he precariously balanced himself on his left foot and lifted his right as high up as it would go - he simply ended up kicking her shin with his leather boot and stumbled forward to fall into her arms. 

  
  


“Lost two to a Nazi gobshite three weeks ago,” he giggled as she pushed him down on the couch with a scowl and let him sprawl over the cushions. “They lack inventiveness when it comes to torture, you know, the Germans. Mind you, I could have lost more than toes if Marie hadn’t shot him in the back of the head. Sawed-off shotgun, and  _ boom _ , cauliflower skull and brain soup all over the place. That was fun to watch.”

“Stop it, Mister Hynd, just… Stop it, please.”

  
  


She was thankful for the dim light that shielded her livid face from his inquisitive eyes, and she used the time it took her to toss a few logs into the fireplace to wipe her tears and stifle a sob in the crook of her elbow. He hadn’t told her anything about what had happened in that Italian village, and she suddenly wished he hadn’t at all. Tortured. He had been tortured by a Nazi, lost toes, went though the most horrible things her mind could conjure up, and he was laughing at it as if he’d just been on a trip to an amusement park. She hated him. She loathed that reckless nutter who kept drowning the Doctor’s life into danger. She would have to be more careful. Stick to his heels wherever he went, at all times. She simply couldn’t risk anything more happening to that body. Because she could only consider as that. It was just a body. An empty vessel that was supposed to hold the Doctor’s mind. He had lied to her. He hadn’t turned into a human. No man gifted with an ounce of reason or intelligence would enjoy torture. No sensible man would enjoy witnessing the death of another human being. 

  
  


“I miss you so much, my Doctor,” she murmured, clenching her fingers around the watch shaped under her jumper. “Please, come back to me soon.”

“Wha’ was that?”

“I said I hope the war will be over soon,” she shrugged before she went to a cupboard to fetch the first aid kit the Tardis had provided before they had moved into this Hell. “Take off your jumper and roll up your shirt sleeve, I need to clean that. Whatever  _ that  _ is. And you’ll show me your foot, too.”

“Can I have a drink?” he smiled, winking at her above the rim of his finger-stained glasses.

  
  


His question brought a breath that smelled of strong alcohol and tobacco to her nostrils, and she scrunched up her nose in disgust. She didn’t need to answer that. 

 

Rose unpacked her kit and carefully put his arm on her lap she had covered with an already dirty tartan plaid, scared to see so much blood ooze from a large circular wound. She squeezed her bottle of betadine over what she believed to be bite marks and ran a clean cloth all over his arm. The wound didn’t seem to be deep, but the edges were tinted with an odd yellow shade that surrounded an intricate pattern of purple blood vessels. Each puncture was the shape of teeth, though the jaw must have counted less that it was supposed to, and some of them must have been broken. Still, there was no mistaking the familiar shape of a canine here and a molar there. 

  
  


“Who are you keeping in that cellar?” she asked coldly, squeezing some more solution to make sure every cut was properly disinfected. 

  
  


He laughed low in his throat and let his head fall back against a cushion.

  
  


“You mean,  _ what _ , Miss Tyler,” he corrected between humourless chuckles. “I’m not keeping anyone in my basement, that would be abduction. No, it’s worse than a person down there. Brought it back home from Italy to study it. Trust me, you don’t want to see that thing.”

“I want to, though,” she insisted, pulling hard on the bandage around his arm to make sure it wouldn’t get loose during one of his experiments involving fire.

“No, and that’s final,” he firmly reiterated with a shake of the head that made him lose his focus. “Are you done yet? I need to examine the sample I got before the bastard decided to take a bite.”

“No more experiments tonight, Mister Hynd. Do you even know if this is infectious?”

“‘S not,” he whined in that high-pitched tone she abhorred, annoyed by her overprotective attitude. “I double-checked, alright  _ mum _ ? Can I go to my room, now?”

“Shut up and take off your boots and your socks. Call me  _ mum  _ one last time and I’ll toss your booze out the window. Wanker.”

“You make a terrible assistant, lemme tell you, Miss Tyler,” he huffed - though he did as he was told and managed to bare his foot despite his rather uncoordinated movements.

  
  


Rose couldn’t pay any attention to the offensive remark, unable to detach her eyes from the mutilated extremity he revealed. Tears gathered in the corner of her eyes, but they weren’t the consequence of any kind of sorrow. They were the consequence of the gags she fought to keep at bay and all that bile she forced down her throat not to vomit all over him. She hated that man.

  
  


“When did you last clean that?” she asked as she tugged on his trousers to put his leg across her lap.

“Can’t remember,” he shrugged as if he didn’t realize how serious it was - he probably didn’t realize, Rose believed. “It’s fine, doesn’t hurt much. Just itches, nothing a bit of scotch can’t heal. Come on, lass, leave it.”

“You’d better stop talking now, Drostan. Shut up. Just shut up, and don’t move or I swear to God I’ll cut what’s left of your foot and I’ll post it to the Nazis myself.”

  
  


He opened his mouth to retort, only whined again when she stabbed him with the coldest stare she had ever given him and plopped back down against the armrest. 

 

Rose had seen many things in her life, many horrible things and many disgusting things, but nothing could ever compare to that horrifying sight. The outside of his feet looked as if rats had gnawed the flesh that had turned greenish everywhere putrefaction hadn’t spread to yet, and she was quite sure this wasn’t the work of an axe or any blade that had cut through the flesh and the bones after just one hit. The edges were much too irregular. A small swiss knife, maybe, or a worn dagger. She didn’t want to think about the pain he must have suffered, didn’t want to hear his screams that rang in her ears like agonizing ghosts sounds, didn’t want to imagine his face contorted into the purest expression of torment. No, she needed to think about what she could do to make sure this infection wouldn’t swallow his whole limb until she’d have to cut his leg from the knee down. Betadine and antibiotics wouldn’t be enough. She needed to get rid of the rotten flesh before it would get beyond healing.

 

She cleaned most of the wound with what was left of disinfectant in her bottle and her bloodstained cloth, wincing at the feel of the odd shape of his foot between her fingers, swallowing hard at the feel of all the pus and decayed skin gathering on the cotton. He hissed and cursed and clenched his fingers around his trousers. One look at his grimacing face and the pearls of sweat rolling down his forehead had her change her mind. 

  
  


“Don’t move,” she ordered again, throwing her cloth into the fireplace. “I’ll be back in a tick.”

  
  


She disappeared for a short moment and came back with the bottle of scotch he had abandoned in the basement, shoving it into his hand.

  
  


“Drink it all up. I don’t have anything else to knock you out,” she told him before she went back to the fireplace and picked up a firebrand she was quick to dive into the flames. “Come on, drink all you can. Then bite down on your sleeve, I don’t… I don’t want to hear you scream.”

“What ‘re you going to do, lass?” he asked between hurried gulps, eyeing worryingly the metal spike that was starting to glow orange. “I’m fine, it’s nothing, I can live with it.”

“Until I’ll have to cut your whole foot, yes,” she shrugged, wrapping her hand into the sleeve of her jumper. “You should have told me sooner, Mister Hynd. You could have avoided this. I’m gonna have to burn it.”

“‘Course not, it’s fine, I’m telling you,” he insisted - though he made sure to lick to the last drop of alcohol sticking to the neck and prayed he would be drunk fast enough not to feel anything of what was about to happen. “Come on, lass, you can’t do that.”

“I can, and I will. Tipsy yet?”

“Aye, probably a wee bit. Mind you, I always am. Can you… Can you wait until I’m properly out of my wits? Please?”

  
  


She heard so much doubt, so much, insecurity, so much fear in those words that she couldn’t help the pang of guilt that hit her harder than a train launched at full speed in the stomach. She heard the Doctor in that voice. She heard the man she would have died for to spare his life, she heard the man she would have done everything to protect. She heard the man she didn’t want to hear in that moment. 

 

Rose quietly walked to him and sat on the armrest to cradle his head on her lap, cupping his face in a gentle hold. His skin felt hot under her fingers, oozing a sweat that had an awful smell she had only ever smelt on old bacchanals she had met on the Estate where she had spent most of her childhood. Pungent, acrid. All that alcohol his overdosed liver couldn’t process, his body evacuated through his pores. She hated the smell just as much as she hated the man, but in that moment, she didn’t care. She cleaned his face with back of her sleeves and pressed a soft, lingering kiss on his forehead. His eyes fluttered shut and two of his own fingers hooked around her thumb.

  
  


“Did he ever tell you he was lucky to have you?” he murmured, rolling on the side to hug her waist with one arm and bury his nose in the wool of her jumper.

“Who are you talking about?” she asked as she picked his glasses off his nose so he wouldn’t break them.

“The man who gave you that watch you carry around all day long. The man you miss.”

“I don’t think he ever did, no.”

“He should have,” he shrugged, his voice steadily turning into a slur that left no doubt the scotch was taking its toll. “Any man would be lucky to have you. How did I get to be the lucky bastard, eh? What is it in me that makes you stay, lass?”

“I care about you, Mister Hynd,” she smiled down at his face, following the curves of his cheeks with his fingertips. “I just want to make sure you’re alright.”

“Even though I’m a wanker?”

“Even though you’re a wanker. We’ve only got each other, right?”

  
  


He smiled back at her at those words a hugged her tighter for a fraction of a second, even pressed a smack of his lips against her belly. He seemed to believe that was enough of an answer - not unlike the Doctor himself, his actions sometimes spoke volumes more than his voice, and she understood that single, ridiculous kiss roughly translated into an agreement. He remained quiet for a long while, and she wondered if he had finally fallen asleep, and if the mumbles and the squeezes on her legs were only part of his sleep she knew to be ever restless.

  
  


“I should get naked,” he suddenly breathed out through a tired yawn - obviously, he had just been pondering whether it was a good time to tell her that one sheepish confession.

“Why… Why should you?” she asked, trying hard not to let her voice shake as much as her fingers, rather shocked that he would bluntly offer to shed his clothes.

“‘Cause I’m getting properly drunk, and I think now’s a good time to get naked. You might see some other things you’d like to burn.”

  
  


He grunted as he lifted his shoulders from the armrest to tug on the collar of his jumper. Rose bit her cheek in anger when she saw a large laceration that started from his collarbone and ran down through his chest hair to disappear in the dark. He obviously meant to show her his arm and his foot weren’t the only parts of his body that had suffered along the course of his expedition and experiments.

  
  


“For God’s sake, Mister Hynd, where else are you hurt?” she groaned, half-annoyed that he would hide such wounds from her, half-scared that his physical condition might be much worse than she already thought it to be.

“Can’t remember. Lots of places, that’s for sure. I… The Germans weren’t very nice, y’know. The dead weren’t either. You should… Help me out of all these before I go out like that candle, Miss Tyler. I’d just… Appreciate it. If you could take care of all that… When I’m out. Damned fuck, and here I thought I could hold my liquor. Come on lass, help me undress.”

“I bloody hate you, Hynd, I hope you know that.”

  
  


He only giggled when she dropped his head on the armrest and whipped his forehead with the tassels of her shawl.

 

* * *

 


	3. Firebrand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I was in the mood to write more of that story today, so here is the third chapter!
> 
> Remember the tags!
> 
> Thank you for reading, for all the kudos and comments, I'm happy to know you're enjoying this! :-)

* * *

 

 

“ _ That _ had to be the same,” she mumbled under her breath.

  
  


She had already removed his worn jumper, unhooked his loose tie from his neck and was now working on the buttons of his mud green shirt. Each undone button revealed more of an undershirt that must have been white in a previous life, but that was split in the middle by a stain of sweat and was streaked with muck and dried blood. Three layers, four if she added up the thin coat of dirt he had accumulated over several weeks, not unlike the Doctor and his panoply of clothes. The similarities found their end in all those articles of clothing. He was simply Drostan. Nothing more, and Rose would have said nothing less if anyone could actually be less than the cantankerous git dozing off in the couch.

 

He still exuded an unholy smell of cheap alcohol and a strong fragrance she didn’t want to dissect, that only matched the breath that came out of his mouth at each of his mumbles. 

  
  


“Lift up your arms,” she ordered as she grasped the bottom of his undershirt and pulled it up.

“You should hold your breath first, lass,” he warned with a barely concealed giggle, though he still brought his elbows to the armrest to push himself up. “You wanted to knock me out? Bring my nose between my arse cheeks and I’ll pass out for a good two weeks.”

“You are disgusting, Mister Hynd,” Rose grimaced, yanking his filthy undershirt and throwing it on the side. 

“What, ‘s not like we’ve got running water in that hutch. An’ we don’t have anything to bathe or clean up, right?”

“I’ve offered a thousand times to wash your clothes and boil some water so you could actually clean yourself up, Mister Hynd. I’ve managed just fine until now.”

  
  


She unbuckled his belt he would have been quite unable to loosen with his trembling hands, popped his button off and lowered his fly. She was thankful for the relative neat-looking underpants she found underneath his trousers, and she carefully pulled on the garment, taking extra-precaution not to touch his disfigured foot that had started to fester again.

  
  


“Hm, you do smell nice, Miss Tyler,” he nodded slowly, clicking his tongue on the roof of his mouth as if he wanted to taste he perfume. “Just thought it came with you being a woman. Do you mind my smell?”

“You mean do I mind living with a pig? I might, yeah, just a bit. How are you feeling?”

“Don’t know… ” he said, his eyes suddenly dimmed by a veil that wasn’t just woven out of alcohol, but of intense reflection. “Taken care of? Tired and drunk, but mostly taken care of. That’s a rather nice feeling. Have you… Have you always looked after me like that?”

“Well I’ve been trying, Mister Hynd, but you don’t exactly make it easy,” she shrugged, walking to the fireplace to take a bucket of snow she had let melt, a clean sponge and a bar of soap.

“Oh, I know I don’t. I’m, uh, sorry, Miss Tyler.”

  
  


She shook her head at his sheepish confession and apology, not really believing in either of them, and she dropped the sponge in the bucket of bubbling water. She just wanted it to be over as soon as possible. Hopefully, the alcohol would serve its purpose fast enough. Hopefully she wouldn’t have to hear the same screams that had pierced her ears and her heart when the Doctor had changed his entire biology to become a human. She heard them enough in her nightmares, she believed. She lathered the sponge until it was covered with a thick layer of white froth she knew would soon turn grey, possibly brown with all the grime nestled in his every pore. She gently wrung it to get rid of the excess of bubbles and turned on her feet to start with the task at hand.

  
  


“What the Hell are you doing, Mister Hynd?” she shrieked when she saw how he was struggling to pull his underpants down his legs - his uncoordinated movements and probably blurred sight didn’t help much.

“Wha’, never seen a penis before, Miss Tyler?” he laughed a long, high-pitched note, tossing his underwear at her face. “I’ll let you study mine, if you want.”

“As enticing as the offer sounds, I’ll pass,” she shook her hand with a frown of disgust and embarrassment, unable to help thinking about the Doctor and what his reaction would be if he remembered any of that.

“Fine,” he drawled, sluggishly rolling on his stomach and nestling his head in the crook of an elbow. “Got my arse bitten, though, you might have to clean that.”

“How did… Nevermind, I don’t want to know. I suppose you talking about your penis means that scotch is finally in your system?”

“Aye, drunk as a sailor, I am,” he concurred, giving her a fogged look between half-closed eyelids and a goofy grin. “D’ye mind if I nod off for a bit? I… Never had very feisty reactions to… Booze.”

“It’s alright, Drostan,” she reassured him, innerly thankful he would finally keep his mouth shut and let her work. “Just sleep, let me take care of you for once, yeah?”

  
  


He simply hummed his assent, and she barely had time to sit by his side that he was already softly snoring. It was the first time she was seeing this body naked, and while she had daydreamed about how he would look like without all those layers on sparse occasions, that was one of the times she wished he had kept them all on. There was no mistaking the hard, lean muscles under the mucked skin, the angular bones, all the dips and hills moulded into his flesh, and he could have looked perfect. But this time, he was far from being a model of handsome strength. He was more of a dirty derelict wearing the skin of mangled soldier.

 

She reigned her tears in, took a deep breath, and started with the base of his head, the only square of skin that didn’t show any sign of abuse. He only shivered when the lukewarm sponge was rubbed along his the prominent bones on the nape of his neck, snored just a tad more rowdily. Once she was done with that small part, she wondered what she should do next. Everywhere she looked, she saw wounds she was scared would jolt him out of his alcohol-induced sleep, she saw blood and bruises she wished he had been clever enough to avoid. The upper part of his back was an intricate maze of bright red lines surrounded by tender flesh the colour of a blue and purple rainbow. She didn’t want to guess, but she was quite certain these were the traces a leather whip had left in its wake - and the hand that had handled that whip was probably strong and remorseless. Part of the torture he had suffered. Just like the dozens of cigarette burns she spotted along the soft skin of his inner arm. Just like the three missing nails she had never noticed on his right hand.

  
  


“I’m so sorry, my Doctor,” she whispered to herself, wiping the tears that refused to remain hidden any longer with the back of her hand. “I’ll do better, I promise.”

  
  


She ignored her revulsion to hurt him more than he already was and quickly rubbed her lathered sponge all over his bruised back in large circular motions. If she couldn’t wash his body properly, she still needed to make sure he was clean enough not to risk any deadly infections. The beads of water she left in the paths painted with the sponge were thick with dirt, heavy with dried blood and peeled skin, and she was quick to wipe them off with an immaculate cloth that soon turned a palette of dark colours. One swipe of sponge, one swipe of cloth, rinse with clear water, repeat. When most of the grim had been erased from his reddened skin, she reached for a bottle of lotion she had found in her first-aid kit and squeezed a good amount over his sore back. She wasn’t even sure what that lotion was, but she supposed it couldn’t hurt to try - if anything, it would soothe the pain with its coldness. 

 

A snore got stuck in his throat as she started to rub the cold oil into his skin. He rolled his shoulders, arched his back towards the hands she had taken away, scared he was hurting too much, and sighed in satisfaction when she brought them back to his spine. Well, if he could voice his discomfort and his relief through the thick fog of sleep, it would be rather easy to figure out what she did right and what she did wrong, she supposed. He helped. In his own way. That was more than she could have expected from him.

 

She kept massaging his back for long minutes, listening with a small smile to his snores and his sighs, and she was just a bit consoled to feel his hot skin get colder under her fingertips.

  
  


“Hm,  _ the love we share _ , wha’ was it,  _ seems to go nowhere _ , is tha’ right?” he suddenly mumbled against the cushion, drumming the beat with a fingertip on the armrest. 

  
  


Her heart froze in her chest, so did her fingers over his back. Had he really quoted a song that wouldn’t exist for a few decades? Was he really humming  _ that  _ song, out of all the songs he could have remembered?

  
  


“Tha’ was our first song,” he murmured into his arm, reaching behind him to wrap a few fingers around hers. “The first song we listened to, together.”

“Whose song, D… Drostan?” she asked, biting the tip of her tongue with a wince when she almost let his real name slip.

“She was a lot like you, lass,” he breathed out between tired wheezes that clearly proved he was still deep into a slumber. “She was very… Special to me. You… I know why I’m being an arse to you. It’s ‘cause I don’t want you to like me. Hate me, lass. Don’t give me any reason to fall for you. ‘Cause I will. Like I fell for her once. Hate me. ‘Kay?”

“I already hate you,” she assured him, the conviction in her voice a stark contrast with the tempest of grief and longing for the man hidden under his words roaring in the pit of her stomach. “Now sleep, I’m gonna fix your bum and I don’t want you making any inappropriate comments.”

  
  


A shallow giggle fell from his mouth, but he remained quiet after another long snore that was shaped around words she was quite sure were another line of lyrics from the song -  _ I’ll run from you _ , if she wasn’t mistaken. She dried her hands on her cheap dress and dried her tears on her sleeve, going to a cupboard in which she had hidden another bottle of scotch. She was out of betadine, she didn’t have enough to go back to the Tardis to resupply her small kit, so she’d have to work with whatever she could find in their cabin. Seventy-degree alcohol should work well enough to disinfect the wounds etched into his body.

 

She hurried to wash the rest of his body with her sponge and her cloth, soaked a clean cloth with scotch and ran it over every cut and oddly-shaped marks adorning his body. He hadn’t lied about his bottom. The wound was the same as the one carved into his arm - same round punctures, same teeth imprints. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know what creature was capable of inflicting such an injury, especially on this area of a body. She plastered a thick square of gauze over the cleaned wound and, judging she had done her best with his back, she flipped him over to take care of his front. His chest looked better. Just a shallow cut that ran from his clavicle to the middle of his chest, a few scratches that must have been caused by sharp nails, a light burn on his right hip. She washed his skin, dried it, swiped her cloth dripping with scotch over the lesions.

  
  


“And I won’t study your penis, Mister,” she murmured to herself, snatching his underpants from the carpet. “Nope, won’t even look, so if you could keep it down I’d appreciate it.”

  
  


She managed to manoeuver his legs into the undergarment and pull it up to his hips without much trouble, and for a moment she was relieved to see she was done fixing him, and had even done an impressive work given the situation. Until she remembered his foot, and the firebrand she had abandoned in the middle of the angry flames.

  
  


“Right,” she breathed out, raising his leg with trembling hands to settle his ankle over an armrest. “Always keep the best for last, good thinking, Rose. I mean, this musn’t be different from that one time you branded a pig. Easy. It’ll just take a minute. It’ll be all over, very soon.”

  
  


She tugged on the collar of her dress to cover her nose as best as she could and rolled her sleeve around her hand before she went to pick up the firebrand. The metal was glowing orange, almost in a state of fusion, and she knew she needed to be quick before it cooled down.

  
  


“Come on, Drostan, don’t scream, yeah?” she begged him in a whisper, swallowing hard as she knelt next to the couch - if he woke up and jerked his leg, at least he wouldn’t kick her in the face. “Won’t be long. It’s alright, Drostan, I just need… Oh God, help me. I bloody hate you, Hynd, fuck, I hate you so much. Come on, Tyler, come on.”

  
  


She locked her elbow around his knee and ground her teeth together, the scalding tip slowly approaching the mutilated foot. The flesh sizzled, fumes that smelled of charred skin and burnt bones rising in the air. Her heart leapt in her chest when he shot into a sitting position, eyes wide in terror and a shout worse than any she had ever heard in her life burst out of his lungs.

  
  


“What the fuck!” he roared, digging his nails into her arm to try and yank it away, his leg twisting and writhing into her firm hold in a vain attempt to escape the scorching pain. “Fuck,  _ fuck _ !”

“Shut up, Drostan!” she cried out through her tears and her sobs as she tightened her elbow around his leg to secure it. “Shut the fuck up, don’t fucking move!”

“Crazy bitch, you… You…”

  
  


He choked on a breath that stood between a whimper and a cry, and buried his face in a cushion to muffle more screams, more curses. She squeezed her eyes tightly to chase the tears that blurred the horror of what she was doing and rubbed her dripping nose on her shoulder. She hated it, all of it. The sounds he made, the way his leg twitched and his body squirmed, the gruesome smell, the unbearable heat. He blindly reached out with a hand shaken with spasms and clasped his fingers around her shoulder. What could she do? Not much. She simply pressed a kiss to his knuckles and readjusted her clench on his quivering leg.

  
  


“It’s almost over, Drostan,” she sobbed, more to her benefit that his, bringing her firebrand to the part she hadn’t burnt yet. “See, almost done, just… Just a second, one little second.”

  
  


She couldn’t be sure whether she had gotten rid of all the rotten flesh, so she decided to make the torture last just a few moments more - she knew she would never do it again, necessity or not. Better to make sure, once and for all. Then she stopped. The firebrand felt heavy in her sweaty palm, dirty, almost evil, and she was quick to throw it back into the fire and wipe her soot-covered hand on the skirt of her dress. His cries were loud in her ears, the stench heavy to her nose, almost repugnant on her tongue, and she suddenly felt overwhelmed by all those things she felt responsible for, overwhelmed by all those things that infected her like a vicious poison. 

  
  


“Be right back,” she said between hard gulps that kept her bile down her throat, so lowly she doubted he had heard her.

  
  


Rose fled the room as fast as her trembling legs would allow her to and dropped to her knees in the freezing snow. She took a few deep breaths, inhaling the winter wind that was just as scroching as fire, letting it burn its way down her lungs. The silence soothed the screams and the cries that still rang in her ears, phantom sounds that forbade her to forget just how much she had hurt him. She could pretend it was the cold that made her whole body shiver, and not the disgust that made her stomach heave. The white blinded her, and she stared at the white path opening before her until more tears gathered in her eyes. Better than to see fire, to picture his body contorting in agony, to remember those eyes she had never seen so full of terror and hurt.

 

It was only when she heard him call out for her with a rough voice stained with tears and pain that she stood back up. One last breath of fresh air, one last shiver, one last look at the snowy landscape. He needed her.

 

She scrunched up her nose at the smell that still lingered in the room and hurried to sit by his side. His face was wet with sweat and tears, his whole body pulled taut by the rough shivers coursing through his skin, his mangled foot hanging limply over the armrest.

  
  


“I’m cold,” he sniffed, though her welcomed her cold hands on his face with a soft sigh of relief.

“I’ll get you fresh clothes and you’ll sleep by the fire tonight, alright?” she tried to soothe him, wiping the beads of water from his exhausted features with her clean handkerchief. “It’s gonna be okay, Drostan. You’ll be fine, yeah?”

“Did you… Really have to?”

“I did, Mister Hynd. I’m sorry, I did. Let me get those clothes. You’ll feel better in the morning.”

“I wish you didn’t take care of me as much, Miss Tyler,” he tried to joke with a weak grin, poking her hip with a fingertip.

“Yeah, well, make sure I don’t have to anymore,” she retorted as she tugged on his finger and and pressed a kiss on his knuckle. “I don’t like it anymore than you do, in case you were wondering.”

  
  


She disappeared in the single bedroom on their small shelter and came back with a pile of clean clothes in her arms.

  
  


“Do you want to change your underwear, Mister Hynd?” she asked, unfolding plain blue underpants and a brand new undershirt.

“Aye, might as well,” he nodded, already tugging the garment down his legs before his feeble arms gave out and she had to finish for him. “I mean, you did wash me, I don’t want to ruin your efforts.”

“Promise you’ll try to bathe at least once a week?” she taunted as she pulled the clean underpants up his legs.

“I can promise I’ll try,” he agreed with a raucous laugh, helping her shove his arms in the holes of his undershirt. 

  
  


It only took a minute more before she was clad in a wrinkled but recently laundered shirt, an old jumper made of coarse wool to keep him warm, and heavy cotton pants. 

 

Rose knelt in front of him and apologized with a sheepish shrug, letting a bandage unroll in front of his eyes.

  
  


“Seriously?” he grunted, throwing his head back against the back of the couch.

“Just for tonight, I’ll make sure it’s properly cauterized tomorrow and if it is, we’ll let it breathe until it scars, yeah? I’m sorry Mister Hynd, but you asked for this. Maybe next time you’ll think about it twice before you let a wound like that fester in a month-old sock. Come one, give me your foot.”

  
  


She wrapped her bandage tight around his mutilated extremity, unfazed by his hisses and curses, and secured it with a few pieces of tape. She slipped his foot into a thick sock, did the same with the other, and ended with a friendly slap on his calf. She disappeared yet again for a few minutes in the kitchen and came back with a large glass of fresh water and a couple of pills she shoved into his mouth when a yawn threatened to dislocate his jaw.

  
  


“Swallow this up and go to bed, Mister Hynd. Let’s call this a night, yeah?”

“Miss Tyler,” he started after two hard gulps. “Rose… Thanks. Y’know, for… Everythin’.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome,” she dismissed with a wave of her hand, going to fluff up the pillow and spread another plaid over the layers of duvets and covers. “Take this bed, I’ll have the bedroom.”

“No, Rose, I… Sleep with me tonight?”

“I told you I don’t want to study your penis, Drostan,” she smiled - her first real smile in what seemed to be an eternity. 

“No, I meant, as friends, it’s just… Booze and pain? Not a good combination when it comes to my nightmares, and…”

“Fine. I’ll get another mattress, just go to bed, now.”

“And Rose?”

“What, again?”

“I’m sorry. Just that. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” she sighed, a sad sigh that brought a flicker of guilt to his eyes. “I’m sorry, too.”

 

* * *

 


	4. Fever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> Back with a new chapter for this story!  
> Still rather dark, but I'm hoping to add some fluff in the next chapter (or the sixth depending on how long it takes to get where I want to go!)
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it, thank you for reading! :-)

* * *

 

 

She remembered he was always cold. Not uncomfortably so, just enough to feel the difference when his skin touched hers. She was missing that kind of cold. She knew she should enjoy the warmth of that bed when she had suffered from the winter freeze for so long. Cold sheets despite the fire she kept alive next to her mattress. Cold body despite the many layers she wrapped around herself to keep the chilly air away. But that night, she felt warm. Hot, even. In the fog of her sleep, she tried to shift away from that incommodious heat that most definitely wasn’t the Doctor’s. Oh, how she missed him and his cool hands, the lukewarm touch of his fingers on her cheeks. But it wasn’t him.

 

Instead, it was a very human hand that had crawled under her jumper to rest on her hip, and a very human breath that was rolling on the skin of her neck. A very hot human man that was lying close to her. Legs entwined under the covers, chests pressed tight against each other, so tight she felt the heavy rise and fall that came with his laboured breaths. And a nose in the crook of her shoulder, and a mumbling mouth against her clavicle. She had often wondered what it would feel like, to share this kind of embrace with him. With the real him. Not this facsimile that smelled of sweat and booze and cigarette - an acrid fragrance that forbade her to pretend he was the man she longed for, even in the deepest of slumbers.

 

She eased his fingers off her hip with a gentle tug on his wrist, but they immediately hooked into her jumper again.

  
  


“Don’t go,” he rasped, a shallow voice that brought another breath that scorched her skin. “I’m too cold.”

“Get closer to the fire then,” she said softly as she entangled her legs from his and wiggled her hips away.

“No moving,” he protested weakly after a shaky inhale. “Can’t move. Don’t move.”

“I don’t want to combust, thanks.”

  
  


She shoved him away when he tried to pull her back into a hug, annoyed by his heavy warmth and persistence. She tried to give him an angry scowl, but her eyebrows barely twitched. The flames of the fire lit his face too much. Even the orange shadows that highlighted his contorted features and the yellow flickers dancing on his skin weren’t enough to conceal the extreme pallor of his skin. Pearls of sweat, shining on his forehead, tears, hanging from his eyelashes and pooling in the corner of his eye. His breath. His shivers. His warmth. She brought the back of her hand to his forehead and was struck by this warmth she suddenly realised wasn’t normal, even for a human. 

  
  


“Fuck,” she cursed under her breath before she scrambled to her feet.

  
  


She hurried to light the few kerosene lamps lying about the small living-room, fetched the bucket of water she had used to clean him, rushed outside to throw the dirtied water at the base of a tree. She filled it again with fresh snow, the worry flooding her veins enough to ignore the bite of the cold on her bare hands. When she came back in, he no longer was in bed - though the thick layers of covers were gone too. Her attention was drawn to the kitchen, a sickening sound of splashing and coughing and spitting that came from the inform mass of duvet sprawled over the sink. He turned glossy eyes towards her, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, then offered a weak, sheepish smile.

  
  


“Told ya I couldn’t move.”

  
  


His knees started to buckle under him, and she quickly dropped her bucket on the floor to reach for him before he could collapse into a quivering heap on the floor. 

  
  


“Can you walk for me, Drostan? Just a few steps to the couch, yeah?” she asked as she rolled his arm around her shoulders and tried to nudge him up.

“Anythin’ for ya, lass,” he slurred with a slow nod - despite his allegation, the tip of his feet only dragged on the carpet and he ended up on his knees just as they reached the sofa.

“Come on Drostan, get on,” she said, pulling him up and having him sit on a cushion. “Lie down, you need to rest.”

“But I’m so cold,” he protested through his chattering teeth, his fingers refusing to let go of hers. “Maybe… You could warm me up, eh? Share some of that body heat wi’ me. I know a way or two.”

“You have a fever and you’re not cold, you  _ feel  _ cold. I need to get your body temperature down, not up. And for the record, next time you suggest anything remotely sexual, I’ll kick your jewels.”

“You’re no fun.”

“You’re an arse.”

  
  


She snatched her fingers out of his and went back to the bucket. She wanted to be angry at him, but she was only angry at herself. Everything was her fault. Everything this poor and weak human body was going through was her doing - or her lack of doing, thereof. Her only mission had been to protect him until the Doctor came back. Take care of him, make sure he was safe and sound, keep an eye on him at all times and do whatever it took to keep him from harm, sickness and death. He was harmed. He was sick. And if she couldn’t cure that fever, he would die. All because she had given up too easily when he had refused she came with him on his first expedition. She wanted to say she would never let that ever happen again, but she looked at him and wondered if there would even be another occasion to let it happen again.  

 

No matter how many dirty jokes could come out of his filthy mouth, the tremolo in his voice and the gasps sticking to the back of his throat would always speak louder. He was sick. The Doctor had warned her his human body would be more inclined to catch viruses and other bacterias because it would lack the proper antigens to fight them off, and she had a whole stack of pill and other medications to take care of running noses and achy stomachs. He hadn’t warned her he would be the kind of man to let a gruesome wound fester so much his whole system would be infected, and she had nothing to cure that. She needed more.

  
  


“Gonna puke again,” he warned her between odd gurgles, his body rolling to the side with both hands clenched hard over his stomach. 

“Darn, hold it, Drostan, just hold it,” she said as she rushed back to the kitchen to fetch a washing bowl.

  
  


She shoved it into his hands and cringed, nose scrunched up and frown of disgust at the sound of his rough vomiting.

  
  


“It’s alright, Drostan, just let it out,” she soothed with gentle rubs over his back despite her revulsion. “You’ll feel better, it’s okay. ‘M here, it’s all okay.”

  
  


He plopped back down on his back when his stomach finally had nothing more to evacuate, painful whimpers and pants struggling to flee past his lips. His body was shivering so much more it almost looked as if his every muscles were convulsing with spasms. More sweat on his face, more tears on his cheeks, stenched drool rolling down his chin. A skin so white it looked almost translucent, his usually light freckles turned to ghostly reminders that this face wasn’t supposed to look so blank. 

 

She dropped to her knees and took his hand, but it seemed all his energy had been drained from him. 

  
  


“Drostan,” she called him softly, bringing her sponge soaked with melted snow to his burning forehead. “Listen to me, I need to go.”

“Don’t,” he breathed out after he sucked in a gasp at the touch of the freezing water.

“I need to, Drostan, I don’t have anything to take care of you in here. I’m going to the village to find a physician and get you some medication, okay? I’ll only be gone an hour, two at most.”

“No… Please, Rose...”

  
  


She ignored his pleading that sounded heart-wrenching to her ears and pressed a quick kiss to his knuckles. She wanted to stay, make sure this weakened and fragile body wouldn’t give its last breath of life before she could come back. But she knew it would if she didn’t find something to make him better. She picked up one of the duvets he had shed on his way to the couch and tucked him tightly into it.

  
  


“More,” he rasped, tugging on the cover to gather it around his neck. “Cold… I’m…”

“I promise, one is enough, Drostan,” she said as she rubbed him face with the cold sponge once more. “Try to get some sleep, yeah? If you’re sick again, do it in the bowl. Don’t move, stay in that couch. If someone knocks on the door, don’t answer, don’t make a sound. I’m gonna lock the door anyway.”

“No…”

  
  


She took a glance at the cuckoo clock ticking on the wall, and brushed soaked strands of hair away from his forehead.

  
  


“Quarter past four,” she told him, readjusting the pillow under his head. “I’ll be back before six. You can survive two hours without me, yeah? And just so you know, we’re all out of scotch and I’m gonna lock the door to the basement, so there’s no reason for you to get up. Stay in that couch, rest, do you understand?”

“Aye,” he sighed his agreement before he curled up on his side and buried his hands under his pillow.

“Good. Let me get you some water, you’re probably dehydrated with all that booze and puking.”

  
  


She went back to the kitchen and picked a tall glass that had been gathering dust on a cupboard - he wasn’t one to drink much water, she couldn't even remember a time when she had seen him drink water, and only the row of scotch glasses had been perturbed ever since they had settled in that cabin. She filled it up with what was left of the potable water that was delivered to them on a weekly basis, an imposing canister that was still half-full given only she drew from it regularly, and thought it wise to add a straw. 

 

He was already drowned in a slumber when she got back to his side, the fever finally taking its toll on this frail body, but she refused to see dehydration added to the already extensive list of things he suffered from.

  
  


“Here, Drostan,” she said ever so softly, bringing the straw to his parted lips. “I need you to drink, okay? Not much, just a little.”

  
  


He whined low in his throat, but still managed to suckle for a few seconds on the straw and take a few gulps of fresh water.

  
  


“Good, that’s good, Drostan,” she praised with a brush of her knuckles on his cheek. “Just a little more. Good. I’ll leave it here in case you get thirsty when I’m gone, alright? Now sleep, Mister Hynd. I won’t be long, I promise.”

“Be careful out there, Miss Tyler,” he managed to say along a hoarse moan, squeezing his eyes shut when she planted a cold kiss on his forehead.

“I will.  _ Sleep _ .”

  
  


She tucked the glass of water between the cushion and the backseat close to his head so he would be able to drink from the straw without moving too much, then smoothed down the creases of the duvet on his shoulder and gave his cheek one last kiss. She thought it odd, that she hated that man just as much as she cared about him. She was still hanging on that thin glass tightrope between love and hatred, and while she had often slipped towards the wrong side of it, she hadn’t quite fallen yet. If he kept pushing her, she would, eventually. But for now, she didn’t hate him whole. Just that part of him that drunk and swore and made crass jokes and got angry for no reason. The rest, those small parts that laughed and cared and got jolly for no reason. Those were the parts she wanted to save.

 

She walked to the door to the basement, pushed it closed and locked it with a key she stuffed in her pocket. She pulled a pair of heavy leather boots on her feet, secured them with thick laces. She shrugged a heavy coat of wool and flax on her shoulders, buttoned it up. She rolled a long red scarf around her neck, screwed a matching hat on her head, wiggled her fingers into her gloves. The winter wind was still roaring outside, sparse snowflakes crashing against the windows, branches of the trees creaking under the force of the gusts. The last thing she needed was to catch a cold on her way to and fro the dark depths of the forest bordering their shelter. 

  
  


“You gone yet?” he suddenly drawled, lifting up his head to look at her with heavy-lidded eyes.

“Going, Drostan. I told you to sleep, didn’t I?” she cracked a smile at his weak pout as she picked up a lamp from the table, as well as a box of matches and a stick of paraffine. “Do you need anything else?”

“Could do with a goodnight kiss, French style.”

“You’re impossible, Mister Hynd,” she laughed with an amused shake of her head. “Tell you what, I’ll French-kiss you when you stop reeking of scotch and vomit.”

“Deal,” he grinned into his pillow, smacking his lips to fake a kiss.

“Right. On my way, then. Don’t leave this couch, don’t answer the door, don’t do anything stupid. And don’t… You know, die or something. I’ll be back soon. You’ll be fine, Drostan, yeah? See ya?”

“Love ye.”

“I… What?”

  
  


Her heart stuttered into her chest at those words and she turned to face him. He was already fast asleep, snoring and mumbling in his usual restless slumber. She shook that awkward feeling off and walked to the door as she tightened her scarf around her neck. He hadn’t meant that. He was just delirious, some side-effect from that fever. Nothing to dwell upon, really. That couldn’t be the first time he had lied or said something stupid or spoken before thinking. It meant nothing. 

 

She stepped outside on the porch, dimly lit with the orange glow from her lamp and the few rays of moonlight piercing through the dead leaves still hanging from the trees. The door quietly clicked shut behind her, and she made sure to lock it and bury the key in the deep pocket of her coat. 

  
  


“Alright, come one, Rose,” she encouraged herself under a whisper, climbing down the three steps to reach the small path barely defined between bushes. “It’s not that far, it’s okay. Won’t be long, and you need to save his sodden arse anyway. No other choice, right Doctor? You’ll help me. ‘Cause that’s what we do, you and I, we just help each other. Fine. It’s all gonna be fine.”

  
  


She had only walked this path twice. Once with a confused man still adjusting to his human body, which meant she hadn’t paid as much attention to where they were headed as to where his feet landed. Once more on her own, in broad daylight, when the same man had been on that expedition and she had felt too lonely to keep pacing around their small shack. It all looked so different, now. Dark, impenetrable. She knew she needed to head straight in that direction, but the low branches, stacks of snow and recently sprouted ferns made it impossible to follow such a course. She could only rely on the few landmarks she had spotted to guide her steps through the forest - a big rock here, an odd-shaped tree, that one stream of frozen water.

 

It was strenuous, to walk with such uncomfortable shoes on such a hazardous path. Soles getting stuck in crevices of mud, tips getting caught in dead roots, heels sliding on patches of iced earth. Soon, her legs started to protest, muscles burning and joints aching, but she knew she was getting closer. The double-heartbeat that echoed through her chest, from the softly pulsating watched pressed between her breasts, started to pick up as she neared a big oak trunk into which was carved the face of an old witch out of a fairytale. She had seen that tree before.

 

She heard a branch crack in the depth of the darkness. A series of hurried steps among the piles of dead leaves. Something that sounded much too like a giggle.  _ Run _ .  _ Rose, run. _

  
  


* * *

 


	5. Remedy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter for this story!
> 
> I didn't want it to be too suspenseful for now, because this is only the beginning and more is to come!
> 
> I hope you'll like it, I'm really enjoying writing this one!

* * *

 

 

The flame of her lamp started to quiver, shedding threatening shadows on her dark surroundings. The Doctor had warned her.  _ Run _ . Her heart hammered against her ribcage, her ears catching to the slightest of leaf rustles as if it were as loud as crackling dynamite. He had told her it would take them weeks before they would smell them, find where they hid. Obviously he had been wrong about that, too. Her lamp squeaked, rocking back and forth as she ran through the trees. Her tight, heavy coat impeded her steps, her boots slipped on the frozen puddles of mud and snow, her large winter hat kept falling down her forehead. But she ran, like she always did. The sounds of her feet hitting the carpet of dried leaves was echoed by the same sound further to her right, or further behind her, she couldn’t be quite sure with the wind whistling in her ears and the loud pants coming out along steam from her mouth. She just knew they were on her tail. 

 

She hissed in pain when a branch lashed at her cheek and her cold skin split open, cursed when her boot got stuck in a root arching from the ground and she crashed down on her knees. She hurried to scrambled back to her feet and picked up the broken lamp she had dropped in her fall. There was nothing more to light her path, now. Nothing but the pale white light barely strong enough to filter through the maze of naked branches. She bit into a finger of her glove to take it off, shoved her hand under all the layers of clothing to wrap her hand around the key hooked into the same necklace that held the watch.

  
  


“Come on girl,” she begged between shallow and tired pants, letting the heat of the key seep into her skin. “Help me, girl, come on, help me out.”

  
  


Her wide eyes trailed on the solid wall of trees ahead of her, a horizon of black that offered no way out. And she saw it. The small light that flickered in the distance, a beacon that would lead her to safety, away from those steps she knew belonged to those who wanted to see her dead. She was the one holding that watch, so her only comfort was that Drostan would be safe on his own, back at their cabin. She ran even faster, that light fostering renewed energy through her limbs. It wasn’t far, just a minute, maybe less, a matter of a few dozens of seconds. The light got bigger, brighter, and at last she saw that shade of blue she was desperate to see. The sound of the steps following her, tailing her, was gone. She didn’t know if she had managed to put enough distance between her and them, or if they simply had given up on their wild chase, but the rhythm of her run didn’t falter until she shouldered the door open and slammed it shut behind her. 

  
  


“Oh fuck!” she cursed as she let her back plop against the door and angrily tossed her hat on the grating. “Fuck, that was close. Fuck,  _ fuck _ .”

  
  


She swallowed a sob and took a moment to catch her breath and wipe her tears, let the quiet hum of the ship soothe her nerves and calm her raging heartbeat. They had found them. They weren’t safe any longer, not if they stayed in that cabin. Those people, those aliens, would probably need a few more days to make sure she was the one who possessed what they desired. She only had a few days to help him find their next destination. Drostan wanted an expedition to find whatever silly artifact he was after, he would most certainly get his expedition - even if they got the place wrong. What mattered was to leave this place. Hop on a train, or a boat, travel across the country or the world to hide from them. But first, she needed to cure that fever.

 

She pushed herself away from the door and quietly walked towards one of the few doors that were still accessible. The ship had put herself in stasis to avoid wasting fuel, and only the necessary engines, lights and rooms remained. The console was still there, its long glass tube stretching up towards the ceiling glowing with a pale blue hue. The helmet was still there, too. That horrible thing that had transformed her wonderful, brilliant Doctor into that obnoxious git who called himself a professor. The memories of his screams, of his body writhing on the grating, the pain, the agony he had gone through. A sacrifice this Drostan Hynd didn’t even know had gifted him with a life he wasted to booze and phantasmagorical quests. A life he kept threatening because he didn’t realize just how precious it was. A life he didn’t deserve.

 

She picked up the light blue shirt strewn on a jumpseat, almost reverently. The brown pinstriped suit was there, too. And those worn chucks. She was quite sure that wasn’t the way she had left them when she had dressed him with a panoply more fitted to the place and time where they had landed. They drew a silhouette. A flat, lifeless silhouette that held nothing but the ghost of the man who used to wear them. That stain on a lapel, that was strawberry juice, she remembered that. And that tiny hole in the sleeve, that was when had tried - and failed - to fix a cable coupler of some sorts and suffered from an unexpected spark. And that mud on his trousers, and those grass blades on the plastic of his shoes, and this, and that. They all traced back to that wild adventure they had lived on Golpaga V. They had run, laughed, hugged, run some more, hugged some more. It had only been three weeks, and she missed it more than if an eternity had flown and gone. She missed him.

 

She brought the shirt to her nose and inhaled deeply. She was hoping to smell him. But nothing. A faint smell of laundry detergent, maybe. That was one very alien thing about him, the lack of smell. He didn’t sweat, he didn’t spray any kind of cologne or perfume on his neck, even the banana fragrance of his shampoo didn’t last more than an hour because his body catalyzed it too fast. Most of the times, and that probably had to do with their many hugs, he simple smelled of her. Her own perfume. He had no smell of his own - unlike his human self that was drowned in rancid vapours of vomit, scotch and smoke back at the cabin. 

  
  


“I need your help, girl,” she mumbled into the shirt before she neatly splayed it on the jumpseat again. “Drostan… The Doctor, he’s sick. Really sick, and I… I need you. Give me something. Please, anything to cure him.”

  
  


She closed her eyes when she felt the consciousness of the Tardis tickle the back of her neck, and let her in mind so she could probe her memories. It only took a minute before the ship hummed her disapproval and indignation.

  
  


“Hey, that’s not my fault, okay?” she seethed at the ceiling, irritated that she should be blamed for Drostan’s situation. “You have no idea how he is, you don’t know him, and lemme tell you he’s not easy to put up with. He wanted to lock me up in the basement, for God’s sake, what was I supposed to do? Yeah, follow him and risk losing that lousy assistant to a bloody wanker job? ‘Cause that’s exactly what he would have done. Kick me out of this shite cabin and forbid me to ever come back, then what? He’s not the Doctor, he doesn’t even look like the Doctor anymore, and it’s an everyday struggle to get something good out of this drunken bastard! So just give me something to save his bloody arse and we’ll get going, ‘cause in case you haven’t noticed, they’ve found us and we’ll be dead by the end of the week if we stay here. Is that clear enough, stupid ship?”

  
  


She ended her tirade on a tired growl and furiously snatched her remaining glove off her hand to throw it against the console. The ship remained silent. Rose paced for a long time, from the console to the door, back to console, each passing minute fraying her nerves a little more. She shed her coat, too hot in the warmth of the ship, shed her scarf, was almost tempted to take off those heavy boots that made her mourn her once comfortable sneakers.

  
  


“You’re gonna help me or what?” she finally shouted at the console, punching random buttons with her fist. “He’s dying out there, God knows, he might be already be dead, and you’re just, what, deciding if I’m worth…”

  
  


One of the door quietly, almost ashamedly clicked open at the far end of the console room, and the Tardis murmured a breath of encouragement. She sighed of relief and strode towards the door, only to find a small cupboard that contained a simple med kit much like the one she already had back at their shelter, a piece of ripped paper and a pair of thin silver rings. She picked up the kit first, and flicked it open to find a vial full of bright green pills and a box of cream that smelled of lemon and freshly cut grass.

  
  


“The pills for the fever, the cream for his foot, right?” she asked into the silence, glad to hear a hum that confirmed her guesses. “What about this, then?”

  
  


She carefully picked a silver ring and studied it from up close with squinted eyes, waiting, almost hoping that it would do something alien and wonderful - though what, she didn’t know. But nothing happened. She shrugged, slipped it on her middle finger, and took the piece of paper. A few words had been scribbled, seemingly in a hurry, and her heart sank in her chest when she realised this was the Doctor’s handwriting.

 

_ Rose, _

 

_ These are perception filter rings. If things get heated, put yours on, give one to me. They make us unnoticed. I trust you. Whoever I am, I will always trust you. _

 

_ Love, your Doctor _

  
  


She stared at those words until they got blurred with tears she chased away with furious blinks of her eyes. Perception filters to help them make their way through this mess unnoticed. That was good. Very useful, they would be able to leave that horrible forest with much less trouble than she had anticipated. She folded the piece of paper and slipped it into a pocket of her dress, fiercely ignoring his last words. He trusted her, Drostan trusted her, and that trust implied that she did her best to keep certain death away. She needed to get back to the cabin and take of him before he kicked the bucket.

 

She put her coat, her scarf and her hat back on, tucked her medical kit under an arm and shoved the second ring in another pocket.

  
  


“Thank you, sweet girl,” she said with a small smile, splaying a hand on the wooden door. “We’ll be back soon for you, yeah? Be careful out there.”

  
  


The Tardis hummed one last time, and all the lights in the console room flickered out.

 

She pulled the door open and was surprised to find the sun had slowly started to rise, the darkness replaced by a a bright orange light that oozed from between the bare trees. That would make the small journey back easier. She pricked up her ear before she left the safety of the ship, making sure she could hear nothing more than the merry chirps of birds through the melody of the wind still blowing through the branches. No more voices. No more sounds of steps. She took a deep breath and hurried along the tracks she had left earlier, worried she had already broken her promise to be back within two hours. She knew the sun peeked out of the horizon quite late in the morning that time of the year, and she was quite sure the six o’clock mark had been overstepped. She could only hope he was still asleep to pay any attention to the clock hanging on the wall.

 

As she neared the cabin, she was relieved to find the only tracks etched into the snow were hers. She quickly went to the door and took out the rusty key from her pocket, sending prayers to the sky the man in the couch was still alive. The couch was empty when she stepped in.

  
  


“Drostan?” she called out with a voice overflooded with worry.

  
  


She dropped her kit on the coffee table and called his name again, eyes trying to look everywhere at once for that man she had ordered to stay in that couch, and bloody hell he would drive her completely bonkers before the Doctor would come back.

  
  


“Drostan?” she called out again, louder, even more scared.

“Aye,” he groaned, lifting a hand she spotted behind the counter in the kitchen.

“God’s sake, Drostan, I told you not to move.”

  
  


She rushed to his side, knelt next to his body that was sprawled in an awkward position on the floor. She cradled his head in her lap, checking his skull and his limbs for any sign of injury, but apart from the deathly pallor and fever making his skin probably hotter than the fire roaring in the fireplace, he seemed to be unharmed.

  
  


“You told me you… You’d be back at six,” he breathed out, clutching a lapel of her coat between trembling fingers.

“I know, I’m sorry, I couldn’t find the physician,” she apologized as she tried to pull him into a sitting position. “Why did you move?”

“Thirsty. And cold. So cold, Rose…”

“It’s alright, come on, Mister Hynd, I’ve got just what you need.”

  
  


He whined low in his throat when she tugged on his shoulders again, but he still managed to follow her up back to his feet. She helped him and his quivering legs back to the couch, where he slouched down with a groan and rolled his body back into his duvet. 

  
  


“It’s eight,” he mumbled into the crook of his elbow, the unmistakable tinge of reproach in his voice.

“I’m sorry, Mister Hynd,” she apologized again, running her fingers through his short hair. “I won’t ever leave again, okay?”

“Thought you were gone. Thought I’d die alone.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Drostan,” she firmly reassured him as she reached for her brand new kit and took out the vial of pills. “You’re not alone, and you’re not gonna die, not on my watch, alright?”

  
  


She picked up the empty glass to go and fill it with more fresh water, gathered two pills in the crook of her palm and brought her hand to his parted mouth to let them roll on his tongue.

  
  


“Swallow this up,” she told him, offering the straw and cupping the back of his head to tilt it slightly up. “This’ll make you feel better in no time. And I’ve got something for your foot, too.”

“Stop caring about my foot,” he moaned after a particularly hard swallow, then made a grimace at the seemingly bad taste of the medication.

“You mean stop caring about you? Nope, not gonna happen, Mister Hynd.”

  
  


Despite his protests and weak slaps on her arm, she knelt at his feet and unwrapped his right foot from the duvet, took off the sock and unrolled the bandage from around the wound. Of course, it was far from fine, still red and bloody and looking atrociously painful, but at least, no more pus was oozing from the charred skin. She reached for her small box of cream, thumbed the lid open and gathered a large blob of it on her fingertips. It felt surprisingly warm, like clay that would have been left too long under the sun, and its fresh smell reminded her of New New Earth and its vast plains of fruit trees and tall grass.

  
  


“Alright?” she asked him as she began to rub the pink cream over the wound, careful not to press down too hard.

“Aye,” he sighed, wiggling his three remaining toes for a moment until his foot fell lifeless in her hand. “The pills… Make me sleepy. You’ve not poisoned me, lass?”

“Might have,” she shrugged with a small smile, pinching his big toe in retaliation. “I’ll give you the antidote if you can be nice for longer than two hours, though. No crass jokes, no drinking, no screaming, no insulting me. How does that sound?”

“I knew you wanted me dead,” he snorted before the pills got the better of him and he fell back into a heavy, dreamless sleep.

 

* * *

 


	6. Quid Pro Quo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> One more chapter for this story - and that's where the slow-burn (and basically the plot of the story) really starts, so get ready!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it, thank you for reading!

* * *

 

 

 

Drostan was still fast asleep on the couch, and would probably be for a couple of hours more. That gave her enough time. She hadn’t forgotten about the threat hovering above their heads. Perception filter rings or not, these aliens were still around - or so she believed. Those who had chased her through the forest must have known who she was, and who she lived with. It might have been the Family who had picked up the Doctor’s smell she had left in her wake. It might just have been a few enemies Drostan had probably made over the course of his previous expedition. Whoever they were, they knew where they lived and would be ready to kill them in a matter of days. They both needed to go, leave this cabin, as soon as they could. They weren’t safe any longer.

 

The flame of the candle quivered when she sighed heavily on the page she was reading. From what she had gathered in the piles of documents stacked over his desk, he and his team of nutters had already found a hilt of some sort. An artifact that was part of an ancient sword that held mysterious powers and seemed to resurrect the dead. She hadn’t really wanted to believe in any of those notes he had written after his expedition, but he described the whole adventure with so many details she doubted he could have invented them. And, well against her will, her eyes had been drawn to the locked door in the basement that still rattled every few minutes, ethereal groans filtering through on sparser occasions.  _ Undead _ . He had written about them, too. Rotten corpses that rose again after being hit with waved of energy emitted by the hilt. Not really alive, just enough to chase down humans and try to eat their flesh. A whole army of them, created by the Nazis to have thousands of monsters at their disposal they could unleash on their enemies. 

 

_ Geistkraft _ . That was how they had called this odd energy that could breathe new life into dead people. If she had been a simple girl born in the twenties, she would have thought it to be a dark magical power and accepted some things simply could not be explained. But she was Rose Tyler, and she had travelled far too much for far too long across the whole of time and space to believe in magic. That energy was alien, she was sure of that. Just a piece of alien technology that had been lost on Earth centuries before, and been found by one German bloke who had built a whole legend around it. Nothing more than that. And Drostan was looking for the next part of this weapon. The pommel, according to his drawings and notes. 

 

She sifted through more pages of ancient writings and encyclopedias, photographs of grimoires and artifacts, dozens and dozens of notes. She stopped after more than an hour peeling away entire paragraphs and analysing to the tiniest details an impressive collection of pictures. Her eyes fell on a page Drostan had obviously spent a long time studying, if the scotch stains, the many scribbles that darkened the paper and the rumpled corners were any clues. Ancient writing, made of undecipherable geometric shapes and dots, a code so old it was impossible to crack. Drostan had circled a string of shapes several times - probably in anger, given the paper had been ripped under his pen. It seemed to be important. If only she could…

 

She blinked once, twice, pushed the candle away because she thought it was the light of the flame that was playing tricks on her eyes. She read it. The name. The enigmatic shapes turned to letters, then to words, then to full sentences.  _ Hid it on Halliglun. Gone back to mothership. Need assistance.  _

 

Halliglun. That was the one word Drostan had circled. The location he had been looking for for days without respite. Of course, the Tardis would have stopped translating anything foreign into English for Drostan, lest it would stir his suspicions and bring back unwanted memories that could blow his cover. But she still translated for her. Halliglun. They needed to go to Halliglun, whatever place that was.

  
  


“Miss Tyler!”

  
  


She jumped on her seat at the sound of this shout that echoed upstairs and slammed the encyclopedia shut. Drostan was awake. And that shout that froze her blood and stopped her heart didn’t bode well. She rushed up the stairs, doing her best not to let panic seep into her veins, and her eyes fell on the empty couch. Again. She immediately looked down on the floor of the living room to find his body she could only guess was writhing in pain somewhere.

  
  


“Mister Hynd?” she called out with a trembling voice, scared that she would find him half-dead on a carpet. “Are you alright?”

“What the Hell were you doing in my basement, Miss Tyler?” she heard him ask from the kitchen. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

  
  


Her head shot to the side at the sound of his voice, that gruff voice she usually loathed but was so relieved to hear she almost wanted more. She gaped at the sight, and took a few tentative steps towards him. He certainly couldn’t be the same man she had left on the couch, in a state of near-coma, just a few hours before. Drostan was there, standing in front of the cooker, an oven mitt on one hand, the other handling a spatula. He had changed his clothes again, a white shirt under a dark green jumper, tucked into corduroy pants she believed would look ridiculous on anyone but him. And he looked so  _ fine _ . Cheeks reddened by the heat of the frying pancakes she spotted in the pan, eyes lit up with a flame she hadn’t seen in ages, lanky body moving with both grace and energy. 

  
  


“You know what, nevermind,” he shrugged with a smile that looked rather awkward on his face, usually stuck into a perpetual scowl or frown. “Would you sit down, Miss Tyler, I’ve made some breakfast, and it’s almost ready.”

  
  


At loss for words, she could only nod and walk to a chair he had pulled, then sat down with her hands clasped over her lap. The scenery looked… Odd. Drostan, fearful and fearless Drostan, clean, sober, almost  _ happy _ , cooking breakfast and smiling. Surely, she had spent much longer in that basement than she had first believed. Or her watch must have opened at some point without her realising, and that was the Doctor dancing around that kitchen to make her some tea. It just had to be.

  
  


“Eggs alright?” he asked as he flipped a pancake over and slapped it down on a plate. “Fried or scrambled?”

“Drostan, I…” she started, stopping through her question when he slid the plate in front of her and shoved a fork between her fingers. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I don’t know what that physician gave you, Miss Tyler, but he should receive a Nobel,” Drostan grinned with too many teeth before he went back to his cooker and picked up the kettle. “Never been better. So, fried or scrambled?”

“Uh, I… Scrambled, please.”

“Good, at least I can’t get that wrong. Tea? Maple syrup for your pancakes?”

“Both, thank you.”

  
  


She watched in silence and in awe as he filled two cups with boiling tea, fetched a bottle of syrup he squeezed rather generously over her pancake, went back to the cooker to crack two eggs into another pan. She had no idea what kind of pills the Tardis had given her, but it had worked beyond her wildest expectations. Even his foot didn’t seem to bother him despite his strides and twirls and side-steps. Drostan was completely healed, and more than that, he was healthier than he had ever been. 

  
  


“Hot!” he warned before he spooned a good amount of scrambled eggs into her plate. “Salt, pepper?”

“No, thank you Mister Hynd,” she smiled - though her smile had less to do with her amusement than her relief. 

“Well, go on then, before it gets cold.”

  
  


He fetched his own plate filled to the brim with eggs and pancakes and fried bacon, set it down on the table, and plopped down on his chair with a satisfied smack of his lips. 

  
  


“Why did you do this, Drostan?” she asked, running the teeth of her fork through the inform mass of her eggs. 

“I was hungry,” he answered between two mouthfuls that prevented him to add anything else.

“Right,” she shrugged - she was disappointed, but she guessed it would have been too hopeful to ask for something more. “Well, enjoy.”

  
  


She looked down at her plate, not really hungry herself despite not having fed her stomach for almost a whole day. He was still Drostan. Some things would still be too much to ask, she believed. She observed him, shoving all that food into his mouth as if he’d been starving for days - which might have been the case, as she’d only ever seen him with glasses of scotch and always brought back barely eaten sandwiches to the kitchen. But then, he stopped. He looked at her, swallowed hard once, twice, and put his fork down on the table. He seemed to hesitate for a moment, then half-smiled, his fingers crawling towards her hand before they dared brush against her knuckles.

  
  


“I… Did this to thank you, actually,” he admitted, fully wrapping his fingers around her hand. “What you’ve done for me, for the last few days… You’ve been very kind to me, Miss Tyler. You’ve done some very brave and very kind things. You saved me. You saved my life, and… I know a breakfast cannot be enough, but I just wanted to... Thank you, lass. For saving me and… For everything else.”

“You’re welcome, Mister Hynd,” she smiled - a real smile, a smile that wasn’t just a fake expression to pretend everything was alright. “I’m just glad to see you’re better. You even look clean and decent, which is no small feat, given how you were last night.”

“Had a bath, can you believe that?” he chuckled, putting a set of nails under her eyes so she could have a proper look. “I shaved, brushed my hair, changed my clothes. Even changed the bedsheets and did the dishes. And… I brushed my teeth. You know, ‘cause we had a deal, lass.”

“A deal? What deal exactly?”

“I might have been in the fog a bit, but…” he started with a half-smirk and a light in his eyes that reminded her way too much of the Doctor, “No scotch, no vomit. I deserve my kiss, don’t I?”

  
  


She rolled her eyes at a smile he wanted innocent but that betrayed his smug satisfaction, smacked his head with her napkin when he bent over the table with pursed lips and closed eyes.

  
  


“Just eat your breakfast, Mister Hynd,” she shook her head, then gently kicked his shin under the table to erase that stupid smile from his face. “I have something to show you in the basement.”

“Oh, I quite like the sound of that,” he grinned, tongue tucked between his teeth. “You have my attention, Miss Tyler, please do elaborate. Does it involve less clothes? Your lips on mine? Your lips a bit further south?”

“I remember telling you I’d kick your balls if you suggested anything sexual again, Mister Hynd, this is your last warning. I have something to show you that might be of interest to your bloody expedition and that thing you’re after. And all things considered, I believe it might be enough to arouse the bloodthirsty nutter you are, actually.”

“Well fuck, I’ve barely risen from the dead and you already want me to go on another suicide mission? Gimme some slack, lass.  _ And  _ the kiss you owe me, which is definitely  _ not  _ a sexual suggestion, just a quid pro quo for my good behaviour.”

“Oh shut up, Mister Hynd. And your sodden suicide missions are what you’re paying me for, anyway,” she pointed out. “‘M just here to help you find what you’re looking for. And I think… I’ve found it.”

“Fine,” he sighed before he cleaned his mouth with his napkin. “Then how about we do something fun, forget about the rest of the world for just a bit, eh? Just a little bit, before we get back to the pile of shite waiting on my desk and look into your discoveries that’ll make my gun fire some bullets. This sexual suggestion does not involve you, by the way, and I need my, uh, ammo mags to keep my gun firing, so please keep your feet to yourself.”

“This metaphor only makes me want to cut them off with rusted shears and shove them down your throat, just so you’ll choke to death on them and stop talking. Pig.”

“I see. Well, I suppose joke bouts are not the best idea, then. Don’t worry, there’s always plan B. Can still be fun.”

  
  


Drostan left what was left on his plate abandoned and pushed himself up his chair, his smile considerably shrinking, the light she had loved to see in his eyes dimmed to a dull flicker. She didn’t know what  _ fun _ could mean to Drostan - he laughed at torture and nothing seemed to be funnier to him than try to kiss Death on the cheek, anything could happen with that man. Her stomach flipped when he walked to the small desk behind the couch, the same desk she had put away his pistol gun into. He pulled the drawer open, rummaged through it for a few seconds, and Rose was almost tempted to tell him they didn’t have a second to lose to  _ fun _ activities involving shooting things - neither literally, nor figuratively.

  
  


“Ha! Found it!” he exclaimed, obviously pleased to have found the object of his desire.

“Mister Hynd, I don’t think…” she started through hesitant words, but stopped when she saw what he had taken out wasn’t the gun she expected.

  
  


Instead of a weapon, there was a radio in his hands. A small radio he hurried to bring back to the table, flicking switches and turning buttons until a snowy crackle came out of the speaker.

  
  


“...raided London last night, killing over three hundred people, among which…”

“Oi, shut the fuck up, we said  _ fun _ ,” Drostan growled at the radio, fiddling with more buttons to try and tune in another frequency. “Come on, darn thing, just work, will ye?”

“Mister Hynd, I don’t think London’s broadcasting anything else than news,” Rose said as he moved the long antenna around, then brought the radio closer to the window in the hope of picking up a different signal. “There’s a war outside, in case you hadn’t noticed, and I believe…”

  
  


She was interrupted by the sudden screech of a trumpet playing the first notes of a mellow jazz song and his cheer of victory. He tossed his cap in the direction of the couch with a twirl on his feet, then offered her a hand and a full grin.

  
  


“No, no I’m not dancing,” Rose shook her head vehemently, crossing her arms over her chest. “We don’t have time for dancing, I don’t want to dance, we need to work and get going.”

“Come on, Miss Tyler,” he grinned even wider, wiggling his fingers encouragingly. “The war won’t get any worse if we forget about it for a song or two. One dance, as friends. Come on, just one.”

  
  


Rose looked at him, watched as he started to rock his hips in rhythm with the music and hum along the melody. For the very first time since they had moved into this austere cabin, the atmosphere was filled with something else than sorrow, heavy with something different than angry tension. Drostan. Drostan was different. He was trying hard, so very hard, to make her happy, to show her he cared, to be kind to her. She was both delighted that he finally was proving he could be better than a heartless bastard, and scared that it was only a consequence of the Doctor’s own personality starting to ooze through him. The Doctor had told her his conscience, his memories, everything he was would be imprisoned in the watch, but there hadn’t been enough time to fully explain the ins and outs of the process. What if she had spent too much time, too close to him? What if whatever was inside the watch was bleeding through and reaching out to that body? What if the watch had cracked open, even for a fraction of second, by inadvertance in her sleep, or during her run in the forest? So many things could have happened. So many things could have gone wrong.

 

Rose felt guilty. Not because she might have made a mistake somewhere, sometime. But because she looked at that man, with those round glasses on his nose, with that short hair on his head, with those awfully vintage clothes on his body that should have been enough to remind her he wasn’t the man she missed, and yet all she could see was the Doctor. She looked at that man, with that smile whose corners drooped, with those warm brown eyes and their glint of childish mischief, with those long fingers he always wiggled, like moves accompanying a silent spell to attract her own, and all she could see was the Doctor. For a song or two, she could pretend. He was her best friend. He was her partner. He was the man she loved.

  
  
  


“Please, Miss Tyler,” Drostan insisted softly, just enough to break whatever was left of her crumbling hesitation. “Just one.”

  
  


A single chuckle fell from her lips as she accepted both his hand and his smile, lacing their fingers together and offered a shy smile of her own. If just for a song or two, she could pretend the Doctor really wanted to dance with her.

 

 

* * *

 


End file.
